isthataleopard

700 porters with different coloured caps, eagerly awaiting our bags

Day 1: 29 January 2013
1700m – 3000m
Chaos!!!
Imagine, if you can, standing amongst 100 excited expeditioners and 700 enthusiastic porters at the base of a very large mountain. Our very clever planning team has come up with an organisational system to ensure you know who your guide is and who is carrying your bag at all times – unfortunately the 700 porters are unaware of this plan and have just about tossed me off the mountain in their haste to pick up a bag, any bag, because holding a bag means you have a job for the next 7 days.

The 100 climbers are also feeling a little possessive of bags, as they include the paragliders we hoped to use at the summit, naturally they want to ensure that these bags have been picked up and are on their way up the mountain.

Finally we are off walking and I am actually the first one through the Machame gate, a position I wasn’t to hold again until 8 days later when I was the first person to walk out the gate on the other side of the mountain!

My pilot, Phil, walks through the forest to the first camp.

The heavens had opened up and we started our walk in the pouring rain, but given it was warm walking through the rainforest we began the first of what would become frequent wardrobe readjustments as we climbed. Clothes on, clothes off, wet weather gear on, wet weather gear off etc you get the picture.
We had been briefed for a 6 hour hike to make the first camp and as we were late getting away we fully expected to be walking in the dark. So it was a happy shock to reach camp after 4.5 hours and find it all set up. Adrian, the organiser had bought about 70 bright orange macpac tents which made a distinct impression upon reaching camp. The fun started if you were late into camp and had to go crawling around to find an empty tent. I devised a clever system for this in later days, as my pace got slower and was frequently one of the last into camp.

The orange sea greeting us at the end of a days walk

We had dinner in a big mess igloos and again chaos seemed to be the general theme, but as always in Africa, it all worked eventually and everyone got fed soup and spaghetti. I personally was ecstatic to find that milo was a key ingredient on this trip – after 7 straight days of frequent milo, that enthusiasm waned, but I’m sure my life time passion for milo will return shortly.

I set up my little living area, blowing up my thermal mattress and suddenly realising that it was only ¾ long – I’d forgotten that key element and knew that was going to come and bite me in the butt in days to come. Got out my sleeping bag and liner, but some warm sleeping clothes on, crawled into bed, with my head at the upward side of slope and attempted to fall asleep. The first and major problem became immediately obvious – there was no way my sleeping equipment was going to be warm enough and bugger all I could do about it now at 3000m. Uh oh.

Welcome to the rejuvenation of the is that a leopard blog! Initially I think there won’t be too many leopard queries, but over time they may find their way back into their namesake blog.

So I now find myself sitting in my really rather fancy hotel room, looking down at the marabou storks and across to Mt Meru. Apparently this is really happening.

A group of us all got in together last night, we found each other in Nairobi airport, looking so obviously like people about to climb a mountain that we may as well have had signs painted across our chests.

In a classic display of how small this world is, one of the women I met is a TV presenter doing a story on the climb and fundraising. Turns out she went to the same school, two years behind me and had the same home room teacher… crazy….

We all crashed pretty hard after >24 hours of travel, but all the flights were fine and it’s easy to forget in the fatigue of travel that we are very privileged to find ourselves cramped up in economy class seats hurtling across the oceans to foreign lands.

I’m loving being back in Africa. I seem to have an alter ego as soon as set foot on African soil. Maybe that’s why I love it over here so much, because I like the person I become a whole lot more. For instance I get in, I’m tired, I’m smelly and I’m starving. The priority is a shower so I go to turn it on, it doesn’t work. Australian Pennie probably would have cracked it, but African Pennie just takes it in her stride, has a sponge bath out of the sink, eats a few dusty nuts rolling around in my handbag, climbs under the mosquito net and falls fast asleep with a content smile on her face. Possibly because I know just how uncomfortable the next two weeks are likely to be!

 Everyone I’ve met seem lovely, it’s great to be amongst a group of adventurous spirits, who seem to be easy going, motivated and interesting people. There is a briefing this afternoon so I’ll be interested to see what interesting information gets divulged there. Apparently the weather isn’t looking too crash hot, but I’m sure we’ll make some sort of a plan.

I’ve thrown in a couple of photos – one of my living room floor before I got myself organised to not just climb this mountain but move my life over to Zambia. There were tears shed.

One of my and Libby doing some training for the climb and meeting some friendly kangaroos along the way.

Finally a couple at the hotel, Ngurdoto Mountain Lodge.

Chat again soon xxx